Eric Grossman, American bassist with K’s Choice

Sis reminded me of this classic a few weeks ago.

Yes, it’s cheesy – but has that ever been a reason to dislike a song? Reminds me of some of the stuff by The Cardigans, for some reason.

Omdat ik ook heel veel Belgische liedjes heel graag hoor, wil ik hier dus graag nog een vervolg aan breien.
My Belgian top 5, behoeft weinig commentaar, gewoon stuk voor stuk vree schoon liekes…

Admiral Freebee – Oh Darkness
den admiraal rules!

Absynthe Minded – My heroics, part one
Opgepast. Dit is geen vrolijk lied, maar o zo schoon…

Flip Kowlier – Min Moaten
Min moaten, ik zie junder wok geirne! ge zoe vo minder sentimenteel begun doen me zuk ‘n liedje… skwone gedoan Flipke!

K’s Choice (& Skin) – Not An Addict
zou ze toen al geweten hebben dat ze lesbisch was? met Skin op het podium mogen staan…? ‘k peis het wel hoor…

Milow – You don’t know
meezinger van formaat!

ed x

K’s Choice – Another Year – Watch more Videos at Vodpod.

I love this song so much.Its reminded me the naive and immature 18 years old me whom was went in the South of France -Toulouse- to pursue a higher education.Independance being my motto, its excatly at that time that i felt the beginning of my new own life without any parents, family nearby..You know those years where friendship,the first love, formidables parties, could only lead you to see life beautifully  as if unhappiness never existed.4 Am used to found my apparttement filled with empty bottles of red, cigarettes ashes,a couples of friends “high”, the night was spent talking about the first crush on the campus, religion, recreationnal drugs and all the things that mattered to us.A truly amazing college experience that dramatically shaped my personnality as i started to “think” about the world surrounding me, to confront my own fears,build the real ” me”.

I love this song so much.Its reminded me the naive and immature 18 years old me whom was went in the South of France -Toulouse- to pursue a higher education.Independance being my motto, its excatly at that time that i felt the beginning of my new own life without any parents, family nearby..You know those years where friendship,the first love, formidables parties, could only lead you to see life beautifully  as if unhappiness never existed.4 Am used to found my apparttement filled with empty bottles of red, cigarettes ashes,a couples of friends “high”, the night was spent talking about the first crush on the campus, religion, recreationnal drugs and all the things that mattered to us.A truly amazing college experience that dramatically shaped my personnality as i started to “think” about the world surrounding me, to confront my own fears thus building the real ” me”.

]]> http://33crosbystreet.wordpress.com/2009/11/11/ks-choice-another-year-2/ Wed, 11 Nov 2009 12:13:54 +0000 Eyquem http://33crosbystreet.wordpress.com/2009/11/11/ks-choice-another-year-2/

I

To celebrate LGBT Pride month music-blogger quietcore recently blogged an interesting collection of cover songs by LGBT artists. These blowin’ your cover-posts features music by gay(-friendly) artists inlcuding many of our community’s favorites.

Queer classics like “I will survive” (in a pretty laid-back version by Jill Sobule), “a little respect” (by wheatus and through all the electric guitars still as catchy as the original) or “do you really want to hurt me?” (this time by violent femmes) are no surprises in this context. While songs like “you don’t own me”, “my love” and “are u that somebody” provide more of my beloved SUBTEXT-flavour.

click and listen:

• pt. 1

• pt. 2

• pt. 3

Y’a pas à dire, la Belgique sait faire sonner le rock ! Il s’agit même de la place centrale en Europe.

Et vivant près de la frontière, je m’en aperçois depuis tout petit. Très jeune, une radio a rythmé mes week-end, il s’agissait de Radio 21. Sans doute la meilleure radio rock de tous les temps. Une programmation excellente et surtout la rediffusion de concerts entiers les samedi après-midi. Je me souvient avoir enregistré un live des Foo Fighters sur mon Mini-Disc et l’avoir écouté des centaines de fois. Depuis cette radio a cessé d’émettre, elle a splitté en deux stations : Classic 21 (le Nostalgie rock) et Pure FM (le Oui FM des belges).

Les plus grands groupes sont d’abord passé par la Belgique : Muse, Placebo, Coldplay … Avant d’arriver sur les ondes françaises. Et ceux-là ont été découverts par les radios belges en se produisant sur les scènes belges. Bien sûr, la Belgique n’est pas aussi avare d’artistes “maison” comme K’s Choice, Ghinzu récemment, DeUs, Girls in Hawaï et bien d’autres.

Alors, si vous avez un peu de temps et l’envie de vous immerger dans le rock à la belge, je vous conseille de vous rendre à l’Aéronef (avenu Willy Brandt, – Lille) le jeudi 19 novembre à partir de 19h00.
Une conférence intitulée “Rock en Belgique, il était le rock une fois” est organisée pour rendre hommage à cette place rockantuesque. Et en plus c’est gratuit !
Plus d’infos en cliquant sur ce lien.

Very occasionally a group of people get together on the Touchedmix blog and post mixes on a particular theme. Last week, the theme was HEADS, with their features and their functions. I thought readers of this little corner of the music blogosphere might be interested in the two mixes I banged together.

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OVER MY HEAD MIX
1. Aztec Camera – Head Is Happy (Heart’s Insane) (1985)
2. Crowded House – Pineapple Head (live) (1996/2006)
3. Johnny Cash – Mean Eyed Cat (1996)
4. The Dillards – I’ve Just Seen A Face (1968)
5. The Holmes Brothers – Smiling Face Hiding A Weeping Heart (2006)
6. Paul Anka – Eyes Without A Face (2006)
7. The Undisputed Truth – Smiling Faces Sometimes (1971)
8. Justine Washington – I Can’t Wait Until I See My Baby’s Face (1964)
9. The Flamingos – I Only Have Eyes For You (1959)
10. Mississippi Sheikhs – I’ve Got Blood in My Eyes For You (1938)
11. Robert Mitchum – Mama Looka Boo Boo (Shut Your Mouth-Go Away) (1958)
12. Emile Ford & the Checkmates – Them There Eyes (1960)
13. Lewis Taylor – Blue Eyes (2000)
14. Andrew Bird – A Nervous Tic Motion Of The Head To The Left (2005)
15. Nada Surf – The Way You Wear Your Head (2002)
16. The Sweet – The Lies In Your Eyes (1975)
17. Ben Folds – Doctor My Eyes (2002)
18. Josh Ritter – One More Mouth (2006)
19. Kaki King – Saving Days In A Frozen Head (2008)
20. The Lilac Time – The Darkness Of Her Eyes (1991)
21. Thomas Dybdahl – Pale Green Eyes (2009)
22. Ryan Adams – Halloweenhead (2007)
23. The Cardigans – Give Me Your Eyes (2005)

Download

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Justine Washington is better known as Baby Washington; this is the original version of the song covered to good effect by Dusty Springfield.

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SENSES WORKING OVERTIME MIX
1. David Bowie – Can You Hear Me (1975)
2. Tim Buckley – I Can’t See You (1966)
3. Herman Düne – I Wish That I Could See You Soon (2006)
4. Devics – If We Cannot See (2006)
5. Richard Hawley – Can You Hear The Rain, Love (2001)
6. Scott Walker – You’re Gonna Hear From Me (1967)
7. The Righteous Brothers – See That Girl (1965)
8. Chris Montez – The More I See You (1966)
9. Cass Elliot – I’ll Be Seeing You (1973)
10. Blind Boy Fuller – What’s That Smells Like Fish (1938)
11. Smiley Lewis – I Hear You Knocking (1955)
12. The Supremes – I Hear A Symphony (1965)
13. Jim Messina – Seeing You (For The First Time) (1979)
14. Baby Huey – Listen To Me (1971)
15. The Jesus and Mary Chain – Taste Of Cindy (1985)
16. K’s Choice – A Sound That Only You Can Hear (1995)
17. Mull Historical Society – Watching Xanadu (2001)
18. Ron Sexsmith & Don Kerr – Listen (2005)
19. Rosanne Cash – I Was Watching You (2006)
20. The Magic Numbers – I See You, You See Me (2005)
21. Paul Anka – Smells Like Teen Spirit (2005)

DOWNLOAD

Consuming far too much
Ignoring the will to touch
The ones who don’t have food at all.

I’m breathing, I’m wondering how
We watch Wheel of Fortune now
I close my eyes and try to see
A piece of paradise in me

Beat me up and smash my brand new TV
To help me look for a little piece of paradise in me

K’s Choice – Paradise in me

Perusing the calendar, I was shocked to realise that the current decade — what some people call the “Noughties” — is almost over; that we’re about to start the 2010s. And here I am still getting used to the idea of the new millennium. So, with this decade coming to an end soon, it seems right to review my top 10 albums of this period. I’ll try to avoid joining the critical consensus (which probably agrees on albums I either never heard of or don’t like), and obviously I can’t list albums I don’t have. So, no Kid A here.

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1. Johnny Cash – American III: Solitary Man

It’s not necessarily the best album in Cash’s American series, but probably the only one that’ll top one of my annual charts. It certainly is a fine album, with an astute song selection (no peculiar choices such as Personal Jesus, which appeared on the follow-up). Cash had previously taken a Sting song, Hung My Head, and entirely appropriated it, leaving Sting’s original sound like a pale, inadequate and ill-advised cover version by an inferior hack. Here Cash repeats the trick with One, lending gravitas to a song that in Bono’s hands sounds overwrought (Bono really meant it, man). But it is what Cash and producer Rick Rubin do with Nick Cave’s The Mercy Seat that blows me away. For this album, Rubin roped in a few heavy-hitters, including Tom Petty and Will Oldham. I’m not sure it was necessary to do so.
Johnny Cash – One.mp3
Johnny Cash – The Mercy Seat.mp3

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2. D’Angelo – Voodoo

After 2000, I began falling off Planet Soul. Voodoo was the genre’s last high-water mark, even if the likes of india.arie, Erykah Badu and (to some extent) Alicia Keys proceeded to release decent albums (and I suppose John Legend isn’t bad either, even though I own nothing by the man). Before too long, it became a law that soul singers must have uniformly nasal, almost pre-pubescent voices and sing about sex a lot without projecting any confidence that they really know what to do in the sack. D’Angelo, on the other hand, left us in no doubt that he knew exactly how to create a concerto of orgasms.

In terms of soul, D’Angelo fused all that came before, plus a strong dose of hip hop and a shot of Hendrix in one album, creating a whole new, exciting and intensely sexual sound. It had taken him five years to follow up the gorgeous Brown Sugar, and I believe a new album is imminent. Whatever happened before or will happen, Voodoo is Michael Archer’s masterpiece. Had Marvin Gaye lived, this is what he’d have sounded like.
D’Angelo – Untitled (How Does It Feel).mp3

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3. Elliot Smith – Figure 8

Smith’s final album in his lifetime — he died three years later — may not be his best, but even then, it is lovely and affecting. It could have done with some trimming, and the cover is unattractive. You don’t pick up an Elliot Smith album to cheer you up, but the charge of miserablism often levelled against seems unfair to me. There is beauty in Smith’s sadness — made all the more poignant by his apparent suicide (there are theories that Smith didn’t actually kill himself). We owe Smith a huge voter of thanks for his part in inspiring so many of the great acoustic artists that emerged in (and, perhaps, from) his wake.
Elliott Smith – Somebody That I Used To Know.mp3

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4. Colin Hay – Going Somewhere

The solo albums of the former Men At Work frontman tend to be frustrating; amid the near-perfect gems there is so much indifferent filler material. Best, really, to put together one’s own compilation. But then one would not find that some of the mediocre stuff is actually pretty good, but required a few more listens. Going Somewhere does not suffer from this. It is one of two albums on which Hay re-recorded his better songs and a couple of new ones, here mostly acoustically. And it works wonderfully. Highlights include opener Beautiful World (which features the brilliant line “where a man can still be free — or a woman if you are one”), I Just Don’t Think I’ll Ever Get Over You, Looking For Jack (about an encounter with Mr Nicholson), Waiting For My Real Life To Begin and Lifeline.
Colin Hay – Lifeline.mp3

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5. Jill Sobule – Pink Pearl

Sobule kissed a girl and liked it long before Katy Perry did so — and Sobule meant it. Sobule is an engaging lyricist dealing with often unexpected subject matter, ranging from anorexia to the case of a teacher who had sex with her pupil. In turn she can be insightful, funny, ironic, cute, tender and daring. Her music is neither particularly challenging nor bland, and some of the tracks on Pink Pearl are excellent, especially the Bacharach-via-Spektor-sounding Rainy Day Parade. But it’s for the lyrics that I return to it. This, from the also outstanding One Of These Days, always makes me laugh: “One of these days I’m gonna touch the sky. Like that awful song ‘I Believe I Can Fly’, [pause for effect] I believe I can fly.” Download free Jill Sobule tracks from her website
Jill Sobule – Rainy Day Parade.mp3

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6. Lewis Taylor – Lewis II

I’ve read that Lewis Taylor has retired from the music business because his albums didn’t sell. That is a pity. Lewis II (which, you will have worked out, was his sophomore album, following the more psychedelic self-titled debut) is a likeable soulful and funky effort. When white soulsters arrive on the scene, they tend to be matched with their likely influences, invariably from the ’60s and ’70s (usually Curtis Mayfield with a bit of Motown). London-born Taylor escaped such labelling, or at least its accurate application. He drew from the treasury of soul through the ages and created his own unique sound. The album features a fine cover of Jeff Buckley’s Everybody Here Wants You.
Lewis Taylor – The Way You Done Me.mp3

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7. K’s Choice – Almost Happy

In my view, Almost Happy is the Belgian brother-and-sister act’s best album. The title track and Another Year are most affecting, beautiful songs dipped in sadness but not despondency. Both of these, and other K’s Choice songs, find an echo in the music of the wonderful Weepies (another female/male singing and songwriting combo). The stand-out track is the almost gothic (though not goth) Shadowman, a song about depression.
K’s Choice – Shadowman.mp3

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8. Ben Kweller – Freak Out…It’s Ben Kweller

I know, EPs aren’t albums. But I’m not going to list my favourite EPs of the decade (hmmm, or maybe I should), so Ben Kweller’s debut on disc gets in. And what a debut it was. The stand-out track here is In Other Words, which features a few duff lines (including references to passive-aggressive butterflies) but has a tune and, especially, an arrangement that one might not expect from an 18-year-old. The piano and banjo interplay in the song’s climax is exquisite. Kweller later re-recorded In Other Words, as well as the brief How It Should Be (Sha Sha), for his first full album, 2002’s Sha Sha. Both songs are superior on this eight-song EP.
Ben Kweller – In Other Words.mp3

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9. Richard Ashcroft – Alone With Everybody

I’d include this for Brave New World alone. And I‘ll cheerfully admit that I don’t really like about half of this album. But the other half is better than most music he created with the Verve. From his former group, we knew Ashcroft was rather given to kitchen-sink productions, and there’s little here that could be described as sparse (quite in contrast to Elliott Smith). At times the onslaught of instrumentation is sumptuous, at other times one yearns for some respite. Not a great album, but one with great moments. I’d recommend You On My Mind In My Sleep, A Song For Lovers and On A Beach; and strongly advise against Money To Burn, which I think was the lead single.
Richard Ashcroft – Brave New World.mp3

10. Badly Drawn Boy – The Hour Of The Bewilderbeest

The album title merely hints at the punnery Damon Gough engages in here. I like the wordplay in Badly Drawn Boy’s lyrics, even if I find them unnecessary in songtitles (Everybody’s Stalking!). Like almost any studio double album (and how audacious to release a double album on debut), there is a lot of unnecessary music here, and the brief interludes are annoying. But in the day of WinAmp, one can happily re-sequence an album according to one’s tastes. And doing so with this set is a very rewarding experience.
Badly Drawn Boy – The Shining.mp3

Meiner ging mir früh verloren K’s Choice mit “My Dad”:

Enjoy!

A while ago I mentioned that “Good Morning Hope” by Woodface (Gert Bettens band after K’s Choice) was selling for $51.99 at amazon.com and 54.99 EUR at amazon.de.

(Click image for a larger version.)

A nice commenter let me know that it sells for a lot cheaper at Mediadis.com and so recently I decided to spend the 6.99 EUR and get me the CD. That’s a savings of 48 EUR. How is that not a bargain?

The CD took quite a while to arrive – so long, in fact, that I had pretty much forgotten I had ordered it at all. That’s mostly a sign for my bad memory, though.

So this weekend I could finally listen to this album, which was released in 2005 (ergo I’m listening to it four years too late). It starts off nicely with a few melodic rock songs, Something to Break, Living Stone and Are You Ready To Sing.

(Woodface – Something to Break [YouTube])

My favorite song of on the album is number four, though, White Light To You, in which Gert Bettens sings:

“So you learned how to get out here
How to buy to fill a void
And how to shine like California
When your heart feels like Detroit”

This, to me, is the lyrical high point of “Good Morning Hope“, and after this, the album only has a few unsurprising rock songs to offer, plus a few ballads that I personally find too cheesy and trite. Sometimes when Gert sings backup vocals on his own songs, it sounds a little like his sister’s voice is blending in, which makes me miss K’s Choice and has me looking forward to the rumored 2010 reunion. It’s not that Gert’s voice can’t stand on its own – it can and did so on “Shadowman” off of Almost Happy. But somehow, on “Good Morning Hope“, it doesn’t stand out. It’s buried in loud guitars, singing words I don’t care to remember.

Considering this, it’s doubtful if I’ll bother buying his 2007 album Comet (currently twice the price of “Good Morning Hope” – does that mean it’s twice as good?).

In an unrelated note, I also wanted to get me the “Live” CD by K’s Choice from Mediadis, but it’s no longer available. If anyone wants to send me their copy, let me know.

Today I had a little bit of a tough time. I woke up about 5am from severe stomach pains. It was unpleasant to say the least. My alarm clock was scheduled to wake me up at 11 for a 1:15 class. So I guess I had a pretty early start. Not that I usually mind getting up a littler earlier. I often prefer waking up with the sun, but this morning I wasn’t really able to enjoy that.

Lastnight I went to the show at Revolution. I had a pretty good time for the most part. Danielle Hunter is going to offer me a job for spotlight on Weds I think. I am going to email her about it probably tomorrow. I don’t know if I am going to the show at Hamburger Mary’s this Saturday. I might just stay home. Who knows?

As far as eating goes, I was forced to get fast food today. I had an 8 hour schedule and an empty tummy. So that kind of sucks. I wish I would have known that lecture was going to be so drawn out and I would have packed something. Oh well. Next time.

For dinner I ate chicken and little bit of potatoes and green beans. So good there. I think the key part is that I cooked it from scratch rather than it be frozen or prepackaged. I am really getting into homemade potatoes. That was the second time that I made them and they are lovely.

Major masculine feelings lately. Not really going to go all into that right now.

That’s it-

Deyton

Here is a song of the moment
(I’ve actually been listening to this album since about 1998)

]]> http://truthlieshere.wordpress.com/2009/08/22/shadowman/ Sat, 22 Aug 2009 13:27:27 +0000 felipe b. http://truthlieshere.wordpress.com/2009/08/22/shadowman/

Anytime tomorrow
i’ll lie and say “im fine”
i’ll say “yes” when i mean “no”
and anytime tomorrow
the sun will cease to shine…

theres a shadowman who told me so.

De zanglijn uit het couplet van ‘Signs’ van Bloc Party…

… totally sounds like ‘Winners’ van K’s Choice.

Just sayin’.

Enkele beeldjes genomen op het Folkfestival Dranouter (vrijdag 7 augustus). Meer afbeeldingen zijn te vinden op www.pix.ie/hannedeneut

Zo’n dikke 300 jaar geleden schreef de heer Johann Pachelbel een hit, getiteld ‘Canon in d’ – jaja, toen hadden hits nog andere namen dan I love you en Sex on the Beach. U kent het waarschijnlijk van bij de tandarts:

(De man op de foto is trouwens niet Pachelbel, maar Mozart, maar dat is een peulschil in vergelijking met al het muzikale onrecht dat de man in de loop der jaren heeft moeten doorstaan.)

Helaas stierf de heer Pachelbel. Dat was niet zo’n goede zet, want dat maakte van hem een ideaal slachtoffer voor muzikale maffiosi.

Zo is er de heer Wiels, die zijn schaapjes op het droge gehaald heeft met het schrijven van liedjes voor een driekleurige en driemeidige kindergerichte groep. Hij dacht: als ik nu eens de voorlaatste noot van het ostinaat van Johann verander, dan valt het niet op dat ik dat niet zelf geschreven heb. Maar, beste Wielske, wij hebben u door! En het ergste van al: de heer Wiels kan deze job nog niet alleen aan ook, hij heeft hier voor de hulp ingeroepen van twee vriendjes: Peter Gillis en Alain Vande Putte.

(Laat u niet afleiden door Ros-, Blond- of Zwartharig maskesvlees en let vooral op de baslijn!)

Maar dhr. Wiels was niet de eerste die op dit lumineuze idee kwam. Erger nog, een Hollandse eend was hem voor:

Ook in Belgisch-Amerikaanse lesbische kringen schamen ze zich niet voor een rondje pikkedieverij, al doen ze het iets subtieler: maar liefst drie noten van het ostinaat zijn veranderd, en wel de drie laatste!

En nergens staat de arme Johann vermeld als medecomponist! Schandalig!

Als er dan toch een K gekozen moet worden, dan weet ik er nog wel eentje.

Better this way, spread out and receptive, spongy, the way everything is spongy as long as a person looks a lot and has good eyes. He wasn’t so drunk that he didn’t have the feeling that his house was a shambles, that inside nothing was in place but at the same time-to be sure, marvelously sure – on the floor or on the ceiling, under the bed or floating in a washbasin there were stars and chunks of eternity, poems like suns and enormous faces of women and cats where the fury of their species was fired up, in the mixture of garbage and jade plaques in their own language where words were woven night and day into furious battles between ants and centipedes, blasphemy existed with the pure mention of essences, the perfect image with the basest slang.

(k’s choice – to this day)

Not an Addict, K’s Choice (Paradise in Me, 1996)

A lição mais dura para quem se afirma independente, avessa a compromissos e com permanente e total controlo sobre a sua própria vida é mesmo ser apanhada nas malhas do vício. O vício é um miúdo egoísta que consome a vítima regularmente e a leva a tomar decisões com o único propósito de se satisfazer a si próprio. É um abusador que se serve sem piedade, oferecendo alguns momentos de prazer em troca do nosso livre arbítrio.

A vil miúda geria a sua existência ciente e convicta de que apenas dois vícios, multiplicados pelas respectivas variantes , a podiam atormentar… O do trabalho e o da mutilação de pedaços do seu próprio corpo. Nada fazia prever o aparecimento abrupto de um terceiro. A vil bem se encerra sobre si própria em conchinha, mas o dito vai batendo na casca suave e pacientemente com um pequeno pau até avistar uma fresta. No interior, a vil encolhe-se e observa o intruso com desconfiança. O vício fica desde já avisado que a vil miúda não se entregará sem antes travar uma luta feroz. Não antevejo, porém, uma conquista fácil, vitória triunfante ou, sequer, um final bem sucedido.

O primeiro passo está dado: admiti o vício, apesar deste fantástico tema dos K’s Choice o tentar negar.

Existem vícios bons? Há vícios que valem a pena? Entregar-se-iam a um vício sem pensar muito nas consequências?

Since I turned 30 a few days ago, I thought it fitting to come up with a new soundtrack, since the last one I did 3 or 4 years ago seems outdated (and my life was so drastically different then). So here goes….

“Love Will Come to You” by Indigo Girls

And I wish her insight to battle loves blindness
Strength from the milk of human kindness
A safe place for all the pieces that scattered
Learn to pretend theres more than love that matters

Ailene will always be precious to me, for a lot of reasons (naks) and one of them is because of this song. At the height of the great depression, she sent me this beauty of a song, and it helped me understand that truly inexplicable emotion called love. And now, I sing this to all friends who have had their hearts broken. Always, with a catch in my throat

“Me” by Paula Cole

And it is me who is my enemy
Me who beats me up
Me who makes the monsters
Me who strips my confidence

Whenever I feel my confidence erroding, I always turn back to this song and try to remember who the real enemy is. You should meet the “me”, more than 5 years ago; self-loathing, immature, always insecure, self-doubting me. She sometimes still rears her ugly head, but I would like to believe I got rid of most of her sometime back

“The World is Our Playground” by Up Dharma Down

I swear I belong
This is where I belong

Enough said

“Lost” by Coldplay

Just because I’m losing
Doesn’t mean I’m lost
Doesn’t mean I’ll stop
Doesn’t mean I would cross

For those who believe I’m lost…refer to my previous post, and that is all I’m saying about the subject

“Orange Sky” by Alexi Murdoch

When I am alone 
When I’ve thrown off the weight of this crazy stone 
When I’ve lost all care for the things I own 
That’s when I miss you
You who are my home 
And here is what I know now 
Goes like this
In your love, my salvation lies 
In your love

This is my love song for my Lola, my Mom, my Brother, my friends who know me inside and out and who accept me (as cliche as it sounds) for who I am

“Naive Orleans” by Anberlin

And I finally found that life goes on without you
And my world still turns when you’re not around

This is my song for all the men (boys) who have intentionally and unintentionally broken my heart. It took almost half a lifetime of learning (and I’m still learning in some ways) but I think I finally got it

“Grace” by U2

What once was hurt
What once was friction
What left a mark
No longer stings
Because grace makes beauty
Out of ugly things 

No matter what my personal convictions are now, I still believe in grace, a thought that practically changed the world as we know it. And this song, for me, encapsulates this, in the simplest words I know

“Quiet Little Place” by K’s Choice

And now everything I feel
Whether it’s fiction or it’s real
It’s so much clearer
Like the color of this light
It seems more dangerous and bright
But I don’t fear her

For the past 3 or 4 years, my life changed drastically, and as I said before, from my own perspective, I’ve become a much better person because of this. It’s not like a major overhaul of my life, but a slow, subtle, shift in perspective and direction. I know I am still a work in progress, but for the first time in my existence, I am not afraid of where it will take me, be it back to where I came from (I am still very much open to that) or somewhere totally new (and I am not scared to death of that)

And on that note, I would like to thank my facebook friends for the gazillion greetings, my M2comms family for the “surprise” party last Friday and my real family, for the simple but meaningful day I got to spend with them. I did not celebrate my 30th with a bang, but I know this year is gonna be a blast

*as always, no real camera on my birthday, so let’s just settle for this

Grande som de 95